Momma Birds and their Chicks

It all started with the crazy robin.  A couple of weekends ago, this crazy robin started pecking at our back doors, well not really pecking...but rather running into the windows over and over.  So, I covered up the door so the poor, demented bird would not kill herself.  She moved to the other set of doors.  Hudson was terrified, and I must agree with him...it was not only irritating to hear it banging into the window, but a frightening sight when she would run into the door flapping her wings and pecking up and down.  Chris and I thought surely she would realize soon that there was a door there she wasn't going to get in the house!  Finally, my neighbor told me that she wasn't crazy, she was "nesting."  That she was marking her territory and apparently she staked out my backyard as her territory...no other female robins allowed.  So, she was seeing her reflection in the windows and thinking it was other robins and trying to fight them off.  It was a long few weeks of the constant banging...and I'll say honestly I wanted to kill the bird... really I didn't want to kill her, but I wanted someone to.  My neighbor encouraged me to let her be, "that she was just trying to build a family like the rest of us."  Anyway, she has now made the most beautiful nest in the hanging begonia on the neighbor's porch and look what's in there!  I have never seen a robins egg, but they are beautiful and it's actually been kind of fun to see the process.  There are also little baby chickadees in another nest next door...so tiny.  On a side note, when Chris was trying to take the picts of the robin's eggs, momma robin was doing some serious squawking...it was a short photo shoot. A shout out to Gina for this...she's always told me how fun it is to watch birds...maybe she's right. Also a few picts of this Momma with her chicks :-).